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Monday, March 27, 2017

Book Review: American Girl: The Real Z

About the Book
And action! Z knows what she's doing when it comes to making movies. She's an expert at stop-motion video. In this first book about the aspiring filmmaker, Z has to make a whole new kind of movie--a documentary--and it's harder than she thought. Z wants to wow the judges, but she's not sure her ideas are good enough for a film festival. With the help of her friends, Z shoots a lot of footage, but something about it doesn't feel right. Should she start over? As she tries to make a movie she can be proud of, Z discovers that to be a real filmmaker, she'll first have to be her real self.

My Take on the Book
Suzanne Yang or Z and her best friend Lauren love to make movies. They are especially good at making stop motion videos. They work together setting up the scenes, moving the props, videoing the action, and editing.

Suzanne was invited to participate in a contest. She had to produce a documentary film for the Cloud Song Seattle Film Festival. The prize was $1500. Z decides on the topic and believes that the film will be easy to produce. However she soon realizes there will be many challenges.

So some of the challenges like a broken guitar string for a singing group she wanted to record. That the thunderstorm kept them from videoing. The filming took longer than anticipated. And the list goes on and on. What Suzanne learned is that this is where her problem solving skills had to kick in in order to produce the film for the festival. She learned from her mistakes.